


Do You Not Understand?

by wallaby24



Category: Political RPF, Political RPF - UK 20th-21st c.
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-19
Updated: 2017-05-19
Packaged: 2018-11-02 10:01:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,138
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10942182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wallaby24/pseuds/wallaby24
Summary: After the Mays gave their joint interview, I kept thinking about how she had to explain to her mother-in-law that that article was fake and there wasn't going to be a baby.  So here's my interpretation of that conversation, and the conversation that followed.





	Do You Not Understand?

“Your mum called tonight,” Theresa whispered as they lay in bed together. “While you were outside.” She’d been on the verge of telling him all evening.

“Oh?” Philip’s voice was not quite sleepy, but relaxed, as though he were prepared to drift off at any moment. “What did she have to say?”

She rolled onto her side to face his dark form. “She saw the article.”

“What article?” Clearly it hadn’t taken on the looming presence in his mind that it had in hers.

“The one about the baby.”

“The…oh, right.”

“And so she wanted to know if I was expecting,” she said quickly, rushing the words out so she wouldn’t have to linger over them.

“Oh, Theresa…” The love in his voice made her want to cry, and she squeezed her eyes shut. She had to get through this story; he needed to know. “Darling, what did you say?” he asked quietly.

“Well, I told her I wasn’t, of course.”

She’d tried to say them lightly, but the words _I’m not pregnant_ had felt like knives in her mouth: no matter how carefully she maneuvered them around her tongue, they still drew blood. But if she’d thought simply forming that sentence would be the worst of it, she’d been wrong. The worst had been Joy May’s obvious disappointment.

“Oh,” her mother-in-law had said, and there had been such sadness and regret in the syllable that Theresa had felt as though she’d personally slapped the older woman. “Forgive me,” Joy had continued, clearly embarrassed at her own speculation. “I only thought…but there will be time for that another day.”

Well-meaning comments from friends and family that assumed Theresa and Philip would have children one day had become quite standard over the years, and Theresa had learned to brush them off and change the subject. But there had never been any from either of Philip’s parents: no urging for more grandchildren, the way some parents might do; no subtle comments about how lovely babies were, as though the younger Mays were purposefully holding off; no questions about when they might consider “starting a family”—how Theresa _hated_ that phrase, as though she and Philip weren’t already a family. Indeed, it had never been implied that John and Joy had any interest in Theresa and Philip’s future children whatsoever, and the realization that her mother-in-law had silently hoped for an announcement from them for years made Theresa suddenly very, very grateful for the older woman’s discretion and reluctance to pry.

It also made her feel very guilty at having kept the secret from the two people, besides her and Philip, whom it affected the most. The Mays had seamlessly folded her into their family after her own parents had died, loved her as one of their own, and she loved them both dearly in return. Yet she’d left them waiting and waiting for a baby that she and Philip had known for several years now would never come.

Admittedly, Theresa had told no one at all. Perhaps it might have been easier if their social circle had known, and thus the casual comments stopped, but the idea of giving voice to it had been too painful for her to consider. She was not even sure she would have told her _own_ mother.

Yet her mother-in-law’s graceful disappointment spurred something in her. “I can’t,” she blurted out. “I can’t have children.” She’d panicked briefly in the silence afterward, frantically wishing she could grab the words back, not quite able to catch her breath.

“Oh,” Joy had said, a noise that was disappointment and grief and love all at once. “Oh, my dear.” She paused. “I am so, _so sorry_.”

Theresa had felt her eyes burning with tears, and she’d stumbled on, desperate not to burst into sobs on the phone. “Yes, well…that’s…that’s why we don’t have any. So no. No, the article was…was quite wrong.” And awkwardly and quickly, she’d extracted herself from the conversation. She’d meant to tell Philip—he needed to know that his mother, and by extension his father, now knew—but she hadn’t been able to find the words in daylight.

“I told her–I told her I can’t,” she said now. “I…explained.”

His hand reached out to grip her arm in the darkness. “Were you all right telling her?”

“I…it felt right. She…I thought they should know. But I…” She closed her eyes, her face burning at the memory. “It was horrible, and embarrassing.”

She felt his hand caress her arm now, and then move to her cheek. “You have nothing to be embarrassed for, love. Did you tell her…everything?”

“No…no, she doesn’t know why. I mean, she knows it’s my fault, but she doesn’t know what’s wrong, exactly.” She could never have told Joy that. The thought of giving her mother-in-law explicit details of her reproductive system made her cringe.

“It’s not your _fault_ , Theresa.”

“It’s my _body’s_ fault. And that was…the worst of it.” She drew a deep breath. “It made me realise how many people I’ve _deprived_.”

“Sweetheart…” His hand trembled slightly as he stroked her hair.

“Because…because I’ve only ever thought about you. I _hate_ that I’ve kept you from having children; I hate knowing that I’ve…robbed you of something so wonderful. But today…today I realised it’s not just you; it’s your parents, and the grandchildren they won’t ever have because their son married…married _me_.”

“Darling, don’t tell yourself that. Please. You haven’t deprived anyone of anything. You can’t _help_ this. You can’t control it any more than you can control your eye color.”

“That doesn’t change the fact that if you’d married someone else—”

“Dammit, Theresa, I didn’t _want_ to marry anyone else!” he snapped. And then he sighed. “I’m sorry,” he said, gently now. He stroked his hand through her hair again. “It’s only—I don’t like to hear you say that. You’re the only girl I’ve ever loved—I couldn’t have married anyone but you. I love you.”

“I love you, too,” she said, hearing her voice crack. “That’s why I want to—”

“Shh.” The hand that had come to rest on her cheek moved to gently press its fingers to her lips. “I would rather have you than a _hundred_ children. Do you not understand that? Do you not understand how precious you are to me?”

She knew it was too dark for him to see the tears that began to spill over as he kissed her forehead, but his thumb was resting just below her eye, and she knew he could feel them.

“Oh, my darling,” he whispered, taking her in his arms and kissing her again as she buried her face in his neck. “Never forget how much I love you.”

**Author's Note:**

> Also, this is just a friendly reminder to please not make comments to childless friends about when they're going to have kids...even if you think you know nothing is wrong. You never *know* that nothing's wrong.
> 
> Also, I really wish people would avoid talking about "starting a family" when they mean "having kids" or saying "I have a family" when they mean "my spouse and I have children." A couple is already a family, and having children doesn't make them any more of one. If you mean having kids, just say having kids.


End file.
